The Third Day
by Lapiz Lazuli Luna
Summary: The three days following Gotham's final victory over Bane were the longest three days of Selina Kyle's life ... three days of just watching and waiting for the sun to rise again. Contains spoilers for The Dark Knight Rises.


**Day One**

She sits alone in a darkened motel room, balancing a laptop on the tops of her knees. The outside light – a sickly artificial yellow filtering in through the motel blinds – spills onto the floor and blends with the shadows, casting streaks of black across the walls. The woman's exquisite features are cast in the bluish glow of the laptop screen as she types furiously, eyes dancing across the lines of text. She has to know for sure if it's true. If it really worked. If she's truly …

_Click._

Gotham City Police Department – Criminal Records.

Elegant fingers fly over the keys … _clickety clickety click … _the characters appear, one after another, filling the search bar.

… SELINA … KYLE …

_Click_.

Three seconds. Five words appear. Twenty-two characters.

"NO ITEMS MATCH YOUR SEARCH."

She stares. She reads, then re-reads. The words remain the same.

_Click_.

She opens a new tab … types … _clickety clickety click_ … Enter …

Federal Bureau of Investigation – National Crime Information Center.

She types furiously. Same name. Same ten characters. _Click_.

"YOUR ENTRY 'SELINA KYLE' WAS NOT FOUND IN OUR DATABASE."

_Clickety, clickety, clickety, clickety … _she pounds against the keys with an electric fervor. The pages flash before her eyes in rapid succession and still she types on, scouring databases, search engines, birth records, newspapers, secret registries only the most brilliant hackers in the world could break into, even frickin' Google …

One last stop.

_Click_.

_The Gotham Gazette._

Her fingers, spent and aching from exertion, type the letters almost mechanically.

_Click_.

Six seconds. And then her answer.

"YOUR SEARCH FOR 'SELINA KYLE' DOES NOT MATCH ANY DOCUMENTS."

The air empties out from her lungs as she leans back, scrubbing her hands over her face. It's over. It's all gone. Her past. Her sins. Her legacy_. _Gone. That piece-of-filth Daggett had told her it was all a myth, a fairy tale, and as much as she had railed against the words she'd allowed herself to believe them. Honestly, it seemed inconceivable for such a thing to exist, for it to be that easy. Even more inconceivable that someone would just hand it over to her with no real strings attached, without even the hint of a guarantee or any real likelihood that she would give him what he was asking for in return.

And now here she was, sitting alone in an empty motel room, her impossible dream staring her right in the face, spelled out across a computer screen.

Her identity. Gone. Erased. _A clean slate_. She is free. She is free and he is …

She bites her lip against the sharp twinge of pain that seizes her chest. Before she can stop herself, she finds herself scrolling back to the homepage, where the headlines scream out at her in great, bold letters.

"THE END OF A NIGHTMARE: BATMAN SACRIFICES OWN LIFE TO SAVE GOTHAM CITY"

"IN A BLAZE OF GLORY: GOTHAM'S GREATEST HERO KILLED IN NUCLEAR BLAST; MILLIONS OF LIVES SAVED BY HIS HEROISM."

"GOTHAM'S FINAL DEATH TOLL REACHES FIFTY-TWO – BRUCE WAYNE, FORMER WAYNE ENTERPRISES CEO, BELIEVED TO BE AMONG THE DECEASED."

She slams the laptop shut.

The shadows glare back at her as she scowls bitterly into the darkness. Curse them. Curse them all for their ignorance. And curse _her_ for not being able to stop him. For not convincing him to run away with her while there was still time. While they still had a chance. His face fills her mind and she swallows back the painful lump building in her throat. If she could've have stopped him … then he wouldn't be gone. He would still be here, with her, at this very moment in time.

And she wouldn't be alone.

She falls onto the bed, allowing the shadows to sink down into her as she blinks back the burning at the corners of her eyes. She's never been in a room that felt so empty. She's been given everything she's ever wanted and now all she has is emptiness.

Her past, behind her … empty.

Her future, in front of her … _empty._

With a low moan, she closes her eyes and lets the emptiness swallow her whole.

**Day Two**

_ Beep._

"_Hey girl, it's Jen again, um … I-I hope you're doing okay. I'm fine, everything's fine over here, just … just give me a call once you get this, alright? I just … I just want to know that you're still alive. Okay? … Um, yeah. I'll … I'll call you back again later … Bye._"

_Beep._

"_Message erased. You have no more messages._"

She scowls and lets the phone drop from her hand and onto the floor with a soft thud. She downs the last acid gulp left in the beer can before hurling it across the room, bitterly relishing the satisfying clang it makes as it collides with the wall and clatters onto the carpet.

With a sniff, she sinks down deeper into the worn, sagging armchair, pinching the bridge of her nose in disgust. She's a mess. And she knows it. Tangled hair. Bleary red eyes. No makeup. After a few minutes, she reaches over blindly and helps herself to another beer.

Before now, Selina Kyle _never_ let herself get drunk. Ever. Drunkenness means a loss of awareness, a loss of inhibitions, a loss of _control_. And if there's one thing Selina Kyle needs to be at all times, it's _in control_.

And now it's five o' clock in the afternoon and she's literally spent the whole day here in this motel room, doing just this. Sitting in this chair, downing can after can, watching the shadows and shapes swim together before falling into the darkness. Then three hours later she'd wake up to an unbearable headache and find herself reaching mindlessly for another can.

The static buzzing of the television fills her ears … "_Gotham City officials just announced they will be erecting a twelve-foot statue of Batman in the city's town hall … to commemorate the caped crusader who gave his own life saving the city and its ten million residents from certain doom. Two days after Batman was killed in the nuclear blast that …"_

_Knock! Knock! Knock!_

She starts. The beer suddenly dries and sours in the back of her throat. She just sits there dumbly at first, her heart pounding a mile-a-minute.

_Knock! Knock! Knock!_

She grips the arm of the chair. _It can't be. _A jolt pierces through her brain … a ridiculous, impossible hope born of a deranged mind and an alcohol-soaked stupor …

Surely there's only one person in the world who could find her so easily.

She stumbles towards the door. Her hands are trembling violently as she twists the knob. She doesn't even bother to check the peephole. If it's true … then she has to see him with her own eyes, face-to-face.

The door swings open.

On the other side, an irritated-looking John Blake narrows his eyes at the former cat burglar, beholding her in all her disheveled inebriation.

"I hope I haven't interrupted your cat nap," he says drily.

She closes her eyes, the pain in her head suddenly magnified ten times over. She's way too hung over to come up with something sassy or clever. "How did you find me?"

"In case you've forgotten, I have a knack for tracking people down … _especially_ the kinds of people who don't want to be found. It wasn't easy. You sure know how to travel fast, I'll give you that. But everyone leaves a trail. The Batpod out front was a dead-give away."

She sighs and rolls her eyes. "I repainted it."

"Cobalt blue. Yeah, I noticed. Did a decent enough job of it. You could probably fool most people into thinking it's just a tricked out bike."

"Am I under arrest?"

"I don't have that kind of authority. I quit the force a few hours ago."

This catches her by surprise. She narrows her eyes disbelievingly.

"And even if I didn't, what grounds would I have to arrest you?" he continues. "You've got no criminal record, as far as I can tell. At least there's nothing about anyone matching your description in our police files."

She sniffs. "What do you want?"

"They had his funeral this morning."

"… I know."

"There were just four of us there. Gordon. Lucius Fox. His guardian, Alfred Pennyworth. Myself. Just four out of the only five people in the world who knew who he really was."

" … Mmm-hmm."

Blake's face suddenly turns dark, anger simmering behind his eyes. "Real sad to see the fifth person was too busy road-tripping and getting hammered to say goodbye to the man she owes everything to."

Her eyes, though bleary, sharpen into daggers. "Well excuse me if I didn't feel like sticking around to pay my respects to an _empty coffin_," she spits acidly.

They just stand there staring at each other for the longest time. Before long, Blake's face begins to blur and swim within her vision. When he speaks again, his voice sounds like it's coming from underwater.

"What are you going to do now?"

She closes her eyes. "Dunno."

"Oh, really."

She opens her eyes, rolls them. "It seems I have a bad habit of not thinking through things in the long term, I guess."

"Even more reason for me to say what I came all this way to tell you."

She chuckles darkly. "It wasn't to chew me out for not coming to his precious funeral?"

"No. It was to make sure you don't go and dishonor his memory."

The smirk falls from her face.

"Selina …" Blake leans in, his jaw set and his face looking more determined than she's ever seen him. "When Bruce gave you that program, he did it because he truly believed there was something good in you. Something _worth_ giving a second chance. He didn't give you a clean slate just so you can go and sully it all over again with the same old crap that's defined you for the past twelve years."

"Maybe I already know that," she growls irritably.

"But you're a creature of habit, Selina. No, trust me, I know your type all too well. You get second chances and you squander them. You take them and then you turn around and stroll right back to your old ways. People like you don't really care about turning their lives around, not deep down. They just want a get-out-of-jail free card. And they couldn't care less about the ones who gave up everything in hopes of saving them."

"_You don't know anything about me, Blake._"

"Then prove to me that I'm wrong. Prove to me that you're a better person than that. That you're really the person he believed you to be. If you really cared about him at all, Selina, then don't take this last gift he's given you and muck it all up. You've already betrayed him once when he was alive. Don't betray him forever now that he's gone."

She closes her eyes, tilts her head back silently. "Are you done?" she says in a tired voice.

He shoves his hands into his pockets. "Yeah. I'm done." He turns and walks off down the hallway. "Stay out of trouble, Ms. Kyle."

A sniff. "We'll see."

The door slams shut.

**Day Three**

That Blake guy was right about one thing –

She really _is_ a creature of habit.

That's why she's here, at this swanky party in the Ritz-Carlton, twirling across the dance floor in the arms of New York City's elite, a well-placed glint in her eyes and a coy smile playing across her lips. All around her are jewels and baubles of every color, glittering from a hundred powdered necks and perfumed wrists. The air is filled with the harmonious strains of a violin concerto, the clinks of champagne glasses and the echoes of drunken, empty laughter. It's almost feels like she's back at her old hunting grounds again.

Except tonight she has zero interest in hunting.

No one would think for a moment that she'd spent the last eight hours on the road, flying through the dust across the state lines on the back of her "tricked out bike." In the span of two hours she'd crashed at the cheapest hotel she could find, showered and hit the Manhattan Mall. And she made quite a scene earlier, pulling up in front of the red carpet atop her cobalt blue motorbike, gown and stilettos and all. The paparazzi went absolutely nuts, flashing their cameras in a fevered frenzy, any and all other guests instantly forgotten and left gaping with their mouths hanging open in front of the door. Nobody had any idea who the heck she was and nobody even cared to ask. It was all too easy just to waltz right in, leaving the valets to duke it out over who would get the privilege of parking her bike for her.

Her dance partner at the moment is some thirty-three year-old company bigwig with greasy hair and a whiny little voice who's all too excited about inheriting Daddy's millions. She laughs at his nauseating attempts at humor and gasps at his pathetic little list of accolades, all the while keeping him mesmerized with the sweet façade she's perfected so well over the past twelve years.

"And next Thursday I'll be steering my yacht over to Aruba for a little private getaway voyage with some very lucky ladies. Ever heard of the … _Rockettes_?"

"_Gasp_! Are you serious?" she breathes, her eyes wide and awestruck.

"Oh yes. They were all _so_ excited to jump on board that they had to cancel all five Broadway shows for that day. Ha! It's even better than that stunt Bruce Wayne pulled with the Russian Ballet troupe eight years ago over in Gotham. Remember that?"

" … Sure."

"Ah, poor old Brucey. I actually met him once, back before he turned into that pathetic waste who blew his entire family fortune. Pfft. What a moron."

She bites her lip. "Oh really."

"He left everything he had to his _butler_, for God's sakes! Sheesh, that deadbeat really didn't have any brains left by the time he croaked …"

"Shut up."

"Sorry darling, what did you say?"

"_I said shut up!_"

Dancers freeze, heads spin and gasps resound across the room as the man goes flying into the punch bowl, flipping over the table as it crashes to the floor. Meanwhile his partner spins upon her stiletto heels and marches off towards the ladies rooms, refusing to meet their bewildered stares, refusing to let them see her snap any further.

Selina Kyle _never_ snaps.

She slams the door shut behind her. One quick glance about the polished room reveals that she is all alone. Hunching herself over the sink, her fingers clutch themselves into her hair, each breath tortured and ragged as a single name pounds into her skull, over and over again …

_Bruce … Bruce … Bruce … Bruce …_

She glares into the mirror. Eyes wild, skin ashen, face unrecognizable. But where are the tears, the sobs, the _screams_? The madness surging up from the pit of her stomach, clawing up from the back of her throat? Why even now – here alone in this bathroom where no one can see her – is she still utterly incapable of losing control? Has she really cemented her armor that thoroughly? Has she really screwed herself up that much?

She grips the edge of the sink, sweat breaking out over every inch of her skin. How had she allowed one person – one _man_ – to affect her so deeply? How could she have allowed him to gain so much power over her? She was bound to him from the moment he fired that dart at her on the top floor of Wayne Manor, and he knew it well. That's why he trusted her. That's why he knew she would come back to him that day.

And now he's gone.

One tear – _just_ one – finally slips out, trickling along her nose and splashing against the glistening counter. She lets out a shaky breath and waits for more to follow after. They don't. She already feels something deep inside of her close over that pesky crack in her veneer, locking her emotions in once again.

She sniffs. She wonders if she'll always be like this – walking around, cracked and bleeding on the inside, forever imprisoned within this porcelain shell. Is this really all that's left once the past has been erased? Is this really the kind of person Bruce believed was worth saving?

She turns on the faucet and splashes cold water over her face. She pats her skin dry, opens up her purse, reapplies her makeup. She reaches up to smooth out her hair, refastening the pins until every strand is in place. It takes all the strength she can muster to force the corners of her mouth back into her trademark smile.

She turns from the mirror and walks back out to rejoin the party.

She's barely out the door when she collides with this messy, drunken fool with an old-fashioned top hat pulled over his eyes. He falls against her, groping at her blindly, mumbling incoherently for a few moments as she struggles to push him off of her.

"_Move_!" she snarls, finally freeing herself with one last shove that sends the idiot careening into the wall. She doesn't even spare him a backward glance as she brushes herself off and sashays back onto the dance floor, unsurprised to find the previous punch bowl incident has long been forgotten and that there's a whole line of upper-crust aristocrats who've been waiting eagerly for her this whole time.

It isn't until four hours later that she finally strolls out of the hotel lobby. Her feet hurt. Her _face_ hurts. All she wants to do now is drive back to her hotel room and pass out on the bed. She opens up her purse, digging through tampons and makeup brushes for her valet ticket.

After a few moments, she freezes right in her tracks.

It's not here.

_Crap_ … she tilts her head back and lets out a long, exasperated sigh. Seriously, she's had _way_ too long a night to have to deal with this mess.

She plasters on a smile and walks up to the nearest valet. "Hi, sorry. I can't find my ticket, but I assume you remember me riding my bike in earlier."

The man blinks. "Oh, but … you're husband said you would be taking a cab home, Ma'am."

"_My_ …"

Everything freezes. Time. Breath. Thought. It isn't until twenty minutes later ... when the cab finally pulls up in front of her hotel ... that she can finally feel the blood flowing through her veins again.

She flies out of the door so fast she almost forgets to pay the driver. She races ahead, her stilettos clicking against the pavement, her heart hammering in her chest so loud she swears the whole world can hear it. The first thing she sees is the Batpod parked out in the front lot, and her head spins about, frantically searching. Finally, after a few moments a dark figure emerges from the shadows – the shape of a disheveled man wobbling forward and hunched over his walking cane.

"So, about this paint job …" There's a soft clanging sound as the figure taps his cane against the bike. "I kinda like it. Never thought blue was really your color, but I think it suits the Batpod just fine. You should've asked first, though, seeing as I really only gave it to you on lend."

She stares straight at him, still disbelieving, her mind not yet fully caught up to her racing heart. "Is this whole resurrection act going be a regular thing with you?" she breathes at last.

He laughs, finally stepping fully into the light. "Nah, probably not. You didn't make it easy for me to track you down. Although I understand you'd gotten some help erasing yourself off the face of the earth."

He barely gets the last words out before she steps forward and wraps her arms around him.

Everything around them fades into nothing as she clings to him, unmoving, feeling his heart beat soundly against her own. She presses her cheek against his temple, her voice little more than a shaky whisper. "How?"

She feels him smile against her shoulder. "Turns out Lucius' autopilot program was more functional than he thought it was."

She laughs. A real laugh. The first time in three days. After a moment he pulls away, wincing slightly from his still-healing wounds. She feels a rush of panic as he suddenly grasps at his side – the place where he was _stabbed_ – but after a moment he straightens up, smirking against the pain.

"Now …" he says. "Before my mysterious friend disappeared out over the bay three days ago, he made me make a promise to him that I would keep an eye on you after he was gone. You know, just to make sure don't go terrorizing a whole new line of jewelry stores here in the Big Apple. I take you to be a real independent sort of woman, but you may want to start getting used to having me around. Just to see that you stay out of trouble …"

"Oh, shut up you."

Then there's no more room for words as she presses her lips soundly against his.


End file.
